"Amazing what tickling can do to a child, yes?" says Vicki Panaccione, a child-clinical psychologist and founder of the Better Parenting Institute. Her rhetorical question gets to the heart of an often overlooked issue – that tickling games can be fun, but only if certain rules are applied.

Panaccione suggests that parents keep the following issues in mind:

• Children need to be taught to pay attention to the signals of their bodies and to distance themselves from uncomfortable situations. This lesson begins very early with learning the cues of their bodies.
• When children set boundaries regarding their own bodies, they should be honored. That way, children are empowered to make decisions about what happens to, or what others do to, their bodies. Tickling needs to stop immediately when someone feels it's enough.
• Honoring your children in this way will go a long way to fostering trust in the world, a sense of empowerment and the ability to distinguish good touches/feelings from bad ones.